Short Term Time Travel

[eremite00]

Admittedly, it's been years since I last played Champions. The question I have is that I have an idea for hero called Retrograde who has the ability to travel back in time a few seconds so that when attacking or being attacked, he can jump back and have another chance to act/react accordingly. How would I go about writing up this ability? Is it even possible. I'm still working off Champions 4th Ed., though I'm almost definitely going to buy 6th Ed., as I'm getting back into pencil and paper RPGs.

[Steve Long]

Re: Short Term Time Travel

 

The best, easiest way to do what you want is with the Replay optional power on p. 40 of The Advanced Player's Guide II.

 

Trying to do it without that in 6E/5E would be extremely difficult, I think, and probably even harder with 4E.

[psyber624]

Re: Short Term Time Travel

 

Replay is exactly what you are looking for, but don't forget to consider simpler alternatives (that a GM might be more willing to allow... Replay is an incredibly overpowered ability and one that could quickly get both annoying and out of hand).

 

A simpler, more game friendly way to mimic this sort of power is with CSL's, possibly Overall CSL's, and the "special effect" is that you kept doing something till you succeed, if at all possible. If your roll still fails then it wasn't doable no matter how many times you tried using the power. OCV becomes "I used the power to go back till I hit", DCV "I went back in time and moved out of the path", and Skill rolls "I tried doing this till I got it right". This is simple, easy, and allows you to have most of the "game effects" that you are likely interested in. There are any number of other possibilities along this same line, all using your power description as "Special Effect".

 

Having to actually redo a segment or more of combat could get highly frustrating, both for the GM and for your fellow players. Using the above you avoid the frustration but still have an interesting flavor for your character.

[dmjalund]

Re: Short Term Time Travel

 

Don't forget Danger Sense

[Martin2]

Re: Short Term Time Travel

 

As Psyber624 and dmjalund said it.

 

Your SFX says you travel back in time to retry things but this is only the discription on a very small limitation on a number of powers.

 

So DCV +X, limitation only if can go back in time. This would possibly a -1/4 or possibly even a 0 if you have very little powers effecting time effect powers. Or could cost endurance etc.

 

Similar sort of thing for CSL's and generic skill levels and also Danger sense.

 

You could also have either Aid Speed or Extra Speed costing endurance when you use your time travelling to give you extra attemps at things.

 

To most people you will look like you have no powers as they will never see the SFX as you will be always jumping back in time and will not see you failing.

[griffinman01]

Re: Short Term Time Travel

 

I think a limited form of Luck could also work if you use the optional method of rerolling dice with it. So if you fail a skill check or miss an attack, you "rewind" a couple of seconds and reroll a second time. Since you're guaranteed a better result using this method, as per the rules on using Luck like this, it even fits thematically since you can assume your prior knowledge of previous events allow you to plan for them so you have a better shot the second time around.

[Tasha]

Re: Short Term Time Travel

 

Admittedly' date=' it's been years since I last played Champions. The question I have is that I have an idea for hero called Retrograde who has the ability to travel back in time a few seconds so that when attacking or being attacked, he can jump back and have another chance to act/react accordingly. How would I go about writing up this ability? Is it even possible. I'm still working off Champions 4th Ed., though I'm almost definitely going to buy 6th Ed., as I'm getting back into pencil and paper RPGs.[/quote']

 

I had a character with precognition that allowed her to see ahead in time a few seconds/minutes. So she would shuffle though a bunch of probable outcomes to find one that was most likely to succeed. I bought that with 3 overall levels. She had an activation on those as well because she couldn't always focus in on the right timelines.

 

On top of that she had Danger Sense, which was her subconscious warning her that she was going to be in danger soon (she subconsciously would monitor other time lines ahead of her current place in time).

 

As an earlier edition character she had Find Weakness defined as finding the best spot to do the most damage to the target. I guess in 6e one could buy it as 2-4 extra DC's that she must spend a half phase to use and make a skill roll to activate.

 

Again like most questions like this. As a player you have to ask what benefit the character gains by finding the best alternate timeline to branch to. I would say that that glimpse would:

1. Give clues that make using as skill easier to perform. (Levels with skills)

2. It would also give ideas of what a target is going to do to make it easy to lead them while firing on them. (Levels with OCV)

3. It may also give a warning about something surprising that is about to happen (Levels with DCV and perhaps Danger Sense)

 

If you can quantify what benefits an ability would give then figuring what power(s) are required to accomplish that is fairly easy.